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Creativity Cramp

April 21, 2004

I think I will coin a phrase today. The phrase I will heretofore take credit for is Creativity Cramp.

I am a Web designer. As such I have to be creative on an on-going basis. Every time a client calls and asks me to make him a site I have to be creative and come up with a new design - something that will look attractive, original and will fit the “feel” of the company. This is often quite difficult to do.

I also enjoy writing (and hope some day to be able to call myself a writer). Writing also requires creativity on a daily basis, for I try to write something at least passibly interesting on a daily basis.

Lately I have not done so well on either account. Therefore I have decided to coin the term Creativity Cramp to describe what I have been experiencing - a general failure to be creative. I have ideas - I can see Web sites but when I try to create them they just don’t work out. I have stories to write, but when I put pen to paper (or finger to keyboard) the words simply do not flow. You see? It’s creativity cramp! It’s like writer’s block but it extends to all areas of creativity. Were I to try making a new recipe in this state I have little doubt I would fail at that! If I wanted to try painting the house a different color I’m sure it would look ghastly!

I am determined to beat this affliction. I am guessing a good place to start is getting more sleep. Though I am generally an “early to bed early to rise” type of person I have been lax in that regard lately. Another starting place is discipline; simply forcing myself to sit and create until I have something worthwhile. A third starting place is caffeine. Since I despise coffee I will have to increase my Coke intake. And of course another great place to start is with my relationship to God - I need to make sure I have that all squared away and in good order.

OK, enough of that! Thanks to Blogs4God for the link to yesterday’s entry about Pareidolia & The Bible.

About Tim Challies

I am a follower of Jesus Christ, a husband to Aileen and a father to three young children. I worship and serve as a pastor at Grace Fellowship Church in Toronto, Ontario, and am a co-founder of Cruciform Press.